How to Make a Poultice

How to make a poultice and why you should make it: Making and using poultices have fallen out of vogue in recent years.

About the only place you see it being used on a regular basis nowadays is on horses to keep their legs from swelling. But don't let that stop you from trying it.

You'll likely find that it is still useful to the self reliant person looking for a more natural way to ease pain, swelling, or that annoying wart that won't go away.

A cinnamon poultice has antibacterial qualities.

So What is a Poultice?

A poultice is wet matter applied to an area of the body that is painful and inflamed or that needs to be brought to a head, such as a boil.

The term comes from the Latin word for porridge. At one time, porridge was spread on a cloth and then applied to an area of the body that was inflamed. Or it would be applied to the chest of one suffering from a chest cold. Plain porridge mixed with mustard was called a plaster.

While you likely won't want to try the porridge mixture, you can learn how to make a poultice using medicinal herbs. For example, Calendula can be used this way to ease the pain and swelling of bee stings or to clear up warts. A poultice of Mullein will ease the pain of hemorrhoids.

How to Make a Poultice

If you are using fresh herbs, mix half a cup of the herbs with one cup of water in a saucepan and simmer it for two minutes. With dried herbs, simply mix together the herbs and warm water to make a paste.

If you do make a paste out of dried herbs, then heated water is essential for this to work. You don't want the water to be so hot that it will burn you, but you do want it warm enough that it will open the pores of your skin to allow the medicine to seep through.

Pour the mixture onto a piece of cloth or gauze and apply it to the affected area. Then secure the gauze or cloth with a bandage or towel.

Suffering From a Bad Cough?

If you have a bad cough or other lingering illness that won't go away, raw onions work powerfully to draw the toxins out of your body Here's how to make a poultice using raw onions:

Put a whole onion in your blender and grind it until it is smooth.. Place the onion pulp in a sauce pan and gently warm it on the stove until it is warm, but not so hot that it will burn you. You don't want to cook the onions, but simply warm them.

Wrap the onion pulp in a clean cloth and place it on the chest, and then cover with a plastic wrap. Be generous with the plastic wrap, because the poultice will leak onion juice otherwise.

Leave it on for anywhere from two hours to eight hours. Then discard the onions, as they will have absorbed many of the toxins from your body. Wipe the affected area with lemon juice mixed in water to get rid of the onion smell